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A Starlit Stroll, The Fog, And A Crescent Moon
An Autobiographical Story

"Well, we missed the guitarist, and we didn't buy tickets for the jazz show ahead of time, so any ideas what to do now?"

"Hmm, I don't know. Anything you want to do?" I shrugged.

"Well, I still haven't gone up to Coyote Peak," he said.

"You mean that place you wanted to go on the 4th of July?" I asked.

"Yeah, I mean, if you're up to it. It's kind of a hike and it's late and all."

"Sure, let's go!"

The evening started off innocently enough, just two good friends, hanging out, celebrating my allowance to cheat on my diet by eating pizza. We decided to hike up to the top of the mini-mountain peak within one of our local parks. There was a radio tower up there, as well as large paths, benches, and railings to look out over the city. The park was closed after sunset, but we didn't think there would be much of a problem. So we left the pizza parlor and headed for the hills.

"Oops, I think we disturbed someone," he said as our headlights illuminated a pick-up truck parked at the fenced entrance to the park, with two people sitting in the truck bed. He turned the car around and parked down the road. We got out of the car and started hiking up the road. It was a wide road, often used by hikers and, it appeared, by park ranger vehicles. We passed by the truck, this time on foot, and entered the park. We talked and hiked, and hiked and talked. We chatted about nothing in particular, the kind of conversation two people have when they are good friends, but still getting to know each other; when there is still everything in the world to discuss and nothing has gotten old or repeated. We spoke of ex-relationships and life in general.

"Hey, I have a question," I interrupted him.

"Yeah?"

"Are there any wild animals left in the area?" I asked.

"Why, did you hear something?" he asked back.

"I don't know. I'm just curious," I said.

"Not many. We've pretty much scared them all off. But you're supposed to yell and make a lot of noise. They don't really like that," he advised.

"OK, so we start talking really loudly now?" I asked.

"Yeah, we should be OK," he said.

So we raised our voices and continued on our walk. About 30 minutes later, we reached the top. "Stop. You see that?" he asked. "Deer."

Directly in front of us, where the path curved around the top of the hill, a group of 4 deer stood silhouetted against the night sky. The largest of the group turned her head to look at us. It was picture perfect, her strong, majestic neck rising out of the tall grass, her head turned so her ears were outlined in their upraised awareness stance. She and the others stood absolutely still for a moment, assessing the situation. We continued walking, but slowly, talking in low voices. We had no desire to spook them any more than necessary. We kept our eyes on the magnificent animals as they began moving again, slowly, unsure of the situation. A few more feet and they bounded out of view on the other side of the hilltop. We continued our walk to the far side of the peak.

With a mixture of awe and condemnation, we gazed over the city. We admired the light twinkling on the ground below us and in the sky above us, and discussed the traffic, population and smog problem our area was developing.

"OK, that's 101, and that is, I think, Blossom Hill?"

"I can't tell. I know that large dark area is the hill between us and Silver Creek Valley," I said.

"You see that long, straight line of lights? That could be the Steven's Creek Auto Row," he said.

"No, it's too close. See what direction it's going? It might be the Capitol Auto Row," I suggested.

"Ah, you're right; it's not Steven's Creek. Could it be 87?" he asked.

"No, it's not one of the freeways. They're not very well lit. Have you ever noticed? They're really only lit at the on- and off-ramps. I think you're correct, that it's something like one of the auto rows," I said.

"Ah, yes, it's not a freeway. And up there, see that large area of lights kinda away from everything? That's the quarry at the top of Steven's Creek, so this can't be Steven's Creek."

We went on like this for a while, debating the location of our city, so well known to us from the ground, but a completely new world from up above. I left the railing we were leaning against to sit down on one of the park benches. We talked some more, and city-gazed. I started shivering, although I wasn't too cold. He put his arm around me and we continued to talk and enjoy the view. Eventually we moved from the city-gazing to star-gazing. It would have been the perfect romantic evening, had we been romantically inclined. But it was a wonderful evening for friends too.

Off in the distance, a coyote howled. While I was a bit nervous at the sudden proof of wildlife in the area, we both sat listening to the coyote song. It was a serenade, full of loneliness and free of the tethers of society. He sang to the night stars. His call echoed off the mountains and wavered in the air. He called from a distance and we figured we'd rather keep that distance. Plus, we were both shivering now and he suggested we head back.

We start walking back down the hill, arms around each other, still talking. About a hundred yards or so down the path, he stopped. An instant later, I saw what made him freeze. In the path ahead of us, about another hundred yards down, three dark shapes sat. We dropped our arms and took a step away from each other.

"What is that on the path?" he asked.

"I don't know. Are they moving?" I asked.

"I can't tell," he said.

"What do we do?" I asked.

"I don't know. They don't like loud noises. If we yell and wave our arms over our head, maybe they won't bother with us."

Fear pounded through my body, but I had yet to know terror.

"AAAUUUGGGGHHHH!!!" His yell split the night and bounced off the hills. The objects in the road didn't move.

"Are they bushes or animals?" I asked.

"I don't know."

"Well, why don't we just head back up to the top and not wait to find out?" I asked, my voice starting to tremble. He yelled again. Still, they stayed, although we could not tell if they were immobile or moving in the area they seemed to claim for their own. I took a step back up the hill.

Thud.

A footfall sounded softly to the left, just off the road. We both turned our heads in that direction. We could see nothing. Just rolling blackness reaching to the horizon, where the only distinction was the presence of stars in the sky.

He yelled again. We took another step back.

Thud-rustle.

Another footfall and the rustle of grass. We looked down the road to the dark shapes on the path and back to the unknown sounds coming from just off the path. As my heart began racing faster than I thought possible, we heard a sound that I will never forget. The sound of breathing. A rhythmic, slow, heavy breathing. It sounded like it was coming from the very edge of the road, a mere 3 or 4 feet away.

"Something's there. What do we do? What do we do? Do we go back up the hill? Let's go back up the hill. You've been here during the day, what's up there? Are there any buildings or anything up there? Anything at all?" My body's responses were into overdrive, and I started talking fast and loud. As we stood there, immobilized by fear and indecision, I learned terror. Something was in the grass, close enough to hear its breathing, big enough to hear, not only its passage through the grass, but the actual fall of its feet on the earth.

"Yeah, there's the radio tower and the water tower," he said.

"Can we get to either of them?" I asked.

"They're surrounded by a fence with barbed wire," he said.

"I'll take the barbed wire. I can always get a tetanus shot in the morning. Let's go back up the hill," I said.

"OK, don't run," he cautioned. We were facing the side of the road by now, straining to hear whatever it was off the side. We each took a side step back up the hill. So did the creature.

"AAAUUUGGGGHHHH!!!" he yelled again, waving his arms. The breathing paused. Then resumed. We took another step. So did it. We took another step. So did it. We both screamed this time. Another pause. Breathing again. We slowly advanced up the hill, one side-step at a time. Whatever it was in the grass following our every move. Thud-rustle, thud-rustle, the sound of a great weight hitting hard-packed earth as a body disturbed the shoulder-high grasses.

We couldn't tell if it was human or another animal. Perhaps it was that couple we saw earlier, playing tricks on us. Perhaps it wasn't. Perhaps it was one of those rare, but very real mountain lions in the area, and we interrupted it. Perhaps it was stalking those three shapes down the road, or those deer we saw earlier. And now we were in its path. In an instant that felt like an eternity, I saw newspaper articles relating the tale of 2 local youths found in pieces by a jogger. I saw my parents in pain over hearing the news. I saw everything I never got to do. I saw everyone to whom I haven't said "I love you" lately.

At the same time, all my senses were heightened beyond any level I had ever reached before this moment. I saw the long stems of the grasses waving in the night breeze. I saw the outline of the distant hills against the sky. I saw the path stretching out to either side of us, cutting through the brush. I heard the breathing of the animal that stalked us. I heard the wind gently kiss the grass and the trees. I heard my own breathing and heartbeat pounding in my ears and in my chest. I broke out into a sweat, yet I was cold, yet I wasn't shivering. Every muscle in my body tensed for action. But for what action? We couldn't run. If it was what we thought it was, it would immediately pounce at the first sign of fear. The car was too far away and the top of the peak was mostly unknown. We each analyzed the situation but could come up with no solution. We couldn't outrun it, we couldn't fight it off, there was no one else for miles around, there was no shelter, and we had no weapons or even a flashlight. We were totally unprepared.

My heart beating loud enough for IT to hear, I spoke again, mainly for two reasons: if it really didn't like a lot of noise, I was going to be as noisy as possible, and I couldn't handle hearing that breathing anymore. The heavy in, out, in, out of air rushing through immense lungs was reverberating in my mind. It gave away its location, which both calmed and frightened me. I knew but I didn't know. I could hear something out there, but I couldn't see it. I knew it was large and I knew it was following us, but I had no idea what IT was.

On foot at a time, we inched back up the hill. For every step we took, something else took a step. Step-step-thud. Step-step-thud. As everything and everyone I knew ran around in my mind at the speed of thought, and as the details of our surroundings etched themselves in my memory, I was really only conscious of one thing: step-step-thud, in-out. The sound of our footsteps being matched by something else, breathing just beyond our range of sight. I continually chattered bout how we could get out of this and he yelled and waved his arms every few moments. After an eternity of about 15 minutes, the footfalls and grass-rustling off the side of the road stopped. We stopped. The breathing continued. We scanned all around us, wondering if the creature was alone. We took another step uphill. The breathing continued, the footsteps did not. We took another step. Another. Another. Still no matching footsteps. It was staying in its place. We began to walk faster.

We reached the fork in the road where the trail splits to either become the circle around the peak, where joggers and day-trippers will find the benches and railings, or the service road to the radio tower. Out of instinct and a reluctance to break our stride, we took the uphill fork. Halfway there, he realized we had taken the wrong fork.

"Where is the radio tower?" I asked.

"Down the trail and down the other path," he said.

"You mean we have to go back down there?" I asked.

"Yeah," he said.

"Is there anything at all up here where we can find safety?" I asked.

"No," he replied.

"Shit," I replied back.

We agreed to walk back down the road to the fork. It was still another several meters to the spot where the footsteps ceased, but that didn't make me feel any better. I didn't want to take even one step closer. But there was nothing to aid us on this road. We would have to go back down. We started walking down the hill, both of us chattering now. He kept apologizing for taking me here and for leading us up the wrong fork and anything else he could think of. I kept saying "when, when, we get out of here, we'll have a cool story to tell." Now that the footsteps had stopped and we were out of earshot from the breathing, I was beginning to lose my feeling of absolute terror. I was still scared, but my breathing and heart rate were returning to a more bearable level and I could once again think and plan rationally.

We made it to the fork and turned left, up the correct path. Now that we no longer heard the creature, I felt a mixture of security, believing it was not with us, and anxiety for not knowing where it was. At the same moment, we both suggested that one of us walk backwards to watch behind and the other lead forward to watch ahead. I led the way.

We reached the radio and water towers. Both were fenced in their own enclosures, sharing one wall of chain link, forming a backwards L-shape. Three rows of barbed wire lined the top of the fences. We needed to find a way over the fence. At the joint where the water tower enclosure met the radio tower fence in a T shape, there was a Porta-potty and an old, moldy water basin. We looked from the barbed wire to the basin and Porta-potty and decided to inspect the Porta-potty. Some of them are rather well taken-care of. Such was not our luck with this one. We beat a hasty retreat and returned to our inspection of the wall.

"It looks like someone else has tried to get in there. See? The basin wasn't in that spot when I was here before. And the barbed wire is smashed down at the corner," he said. We walked to the joint and I tested the balance of the basin. It held my weight, but I was very unsure of my ability to climb the fence. I threw my overshirt on top of the barbed wire and pulled myself up the fence with a little boost. Holding onto the poles, I somehow managed to crouch at the top of the fence. I reached my foot down and transferred my weight to a large propane tank, which happened to be next to the fence, right behind the Porta-potty. I stood on the tank to lend a hand, if needed. He pulled himself up and over the barbed wire and stood on the tank next to me. We slid down and began to inspect our shelter.

It was freezing. The wind had picked up and the frequency being emitted from the radio tower hurt his ears. We walked around the small enclosure. There was the tall radio tower, and a small concrete building, in addition to the propane tank and several metal pipes coming out of the ground. With no moon out, it was too dark to identify anything in the area, and we didn't know what objects were potentially harmful. As I got colder and his ears hurt more from the proximity to the radio tower, we began to look for another option.

"Look, the wire was pushed down on this side too," he pointed to the joint in the fence that we had just climbed over. The barbed wire on the wall being shared by the radio tower and the water tower had been trampled on both sides of the T intersection. We climbed back up the propane tank with the intention of climbing into the water tower yard, but as he was about to climb over into the water tower yard, I asked, "How do we get back in the morning?"

"I'll worry about that tomorrow," he said. He climbed over the fence and turned back to help me over. I needed a little help, so he offered his shoulder to sit on as I reached the other side. Just as I was about to feel safe from wild creatures, he pointed out that this section was at the base of a hill and any animal with good jumping capabilities might be able to jump down into our sanctuary from the hill. We immediately moved to the water tower ladder.

"There's a grate at the bottom," I said, "but I think we can get around it." I climbed up the few feet of ladder until I reached the cylindrical ladder enclosure, blocked by the horizontal, circular grate. I swung around to the side of the ladder and inched my way up until I could put my feet on the circular iron grate through the bars of the cylindrical safety ladder enclosure. Then I simply slipped in between the iron bars and started climbing again. He followed my example. I reached the top and looked around. As he stepped onto the roof, the thin metal bowed and popped, like sitting on the hood of a car. He immediately froze and recommended that I stay still too. I wanted to walk to the other side of the tower to assess how close the hill was. We inched our way around the edge, where we figured the reinforcement of the walls would strengthen the material. About a quarter of the way around, I could see the hill and it looked far enough away to satisfy me. We inched back to the ladder.

We picked a spot near the edge so the roof wouldn't cave in, but far enough so he wouldn't stress overmuch about falling off. We sat for a while, talking, reliving the experience. I finally had to change the subject because we weren't out of danger yet, and it was only making us both nervous. We sat for a while longer. Our backs began to hurt and we began to freeze in the cold wind. We tried lying down and cuddling for warmth and to ease our backs. We continued our conversation from earlier in an attempt to take our minds off our situation. After a while, the cold metal of the roof was too much to bear, so we sat up again.

We talked. We stargazed. We spoke of our pasts, our dreams, and our beliefs. We had the kind of conversation two good, yet new friends might have on the phone, the kind that lasts all night until the sun comes up and you realize you have to wake up for work or school in 30 minutes. Except we weren't on the phone. We were huddling together for warmth atop a water tower, fearing for our lives. Our feet and hands went from cold to freezing to numb. Our legs fell asleep from our cramped positions, which our cold environment necessitated. We shivered uncontrollably. Several times I had to do some aerobics just to bring the blood flow back to my extremities. He tried climbing the ladder, but eventually, the fog rolled in and everything became slippery.

It was during one of our perusals of the city lights that we noticed the fog. As we watched, the city became blanketed in white. All around us, lights dimmed and disappeared. Hill tops rose above a sea of cotton. We were completely alone. Our little tower became slick with fog. We were afraid to move at all, for fear we might slip right off the roof. We had so far lived through one life-threatening experience only to be faced with another, more subtle experience: hypothermia. Fortunately, this was the middle of summer in California. We were not trapped outside in a snowstorm. The next day was supposed to reach hundred-degree weather, so where was this fog coming from? Where did this wind originate that brought near freezing temperatures and numbed our fingers and toes? What brought about the severe shivering and muscle spasms that were our bodies' way of combating the chill? In the midst of this threat, we were held spellbound by the effect of Nature. The beauty, the deceptive softness of the fog as it crept over the city below us and around us, enraptured us. We could only watch as velvety white completely surrounded our tower, leaving us on a life raft in the middle of a cottony sea of fog. Above, the stars twinkled and traveled in their journey across the sky. Time moved on.

At one point, I had reached some sort of semi-doze sitting huddled together, when he said, "Look, something's rising over that hill. I thought it was a star at first, but it's not. I think it's the moon." I lifted my head and looked. The barest sliver of light was showing above the hill. As we watched the moon slowly lifted herself over the edge. She was waning this night, her fullness barely outlined by the sun, only a small crescent of light reflected from her surface. In a matter of minutes, she had risen above the hills. Her small, but bright reflection added to the splendor of the sky.

"I've never seen a moon rise before," I breathed. It was beautiful. In the cold crisp air, the power of the sun's rays reflected off the diamond-white surface of the moon far on the horizon. Even in her weakened, crescent condition, she was beautiful. We watched her begin her long trek across the sky. As she rose, the other starts in the sky moved to make room for her. All the stars slowly trailed across the sky. We watched the time pass. The moon rose at 4:45 A.M. Eventually, he noticed a star appear on the horizon, just about where the moon had risen.

"Could that be the morning star?" he asked. Sure enough, it was. An hour after the moon breached the hills, half an hour after the appearance of the morning star, the sky began to lighten. We were no longer floating in the middle of a fog-lake of fluffy whiteness with a black velvet ceiling studded with diamonds. We were now once again sitting on a metal water tower, in the middle of nowhere, with hills and partially fog-obscured roadways below us and a dark blue sky above us. The sky lightened from black, to inky-blue, and lighter still, until we could see a splash of gold on the horizon where the moon once peeked over the hills.

We stood up when we could see, once again, in color, and began stretching our tortured muscles for the climb back down.

"Be careful, it's really slippery," he advised. I waited until he reached the grate at the bottom of the cylindrical enclosure, and then began my descent. The wet rungs of the ladder threatened my grip; my feet were constantly trying to slide out from under me. Slowly, I made my way back down the ladder, the same way I came up. Hard-packed warm earth met my feet. I was never so thrilled to feel soil beneath my boots. As he walked around the other side of the water tower to relieve himself, I ran laps in our little yard to bring the feeling back into my hands and feet and to limber up for the climb over the fence we had yet to face. Some of the blood flow returned, but my muscles actively refused to cooperate. They were spasming with cold and stress from the terror experienced the night before.

After what felt like several minutes, he had not returned from his morning constitutional, I irrationally began to fear something had happened to him. Leftover, I guess, from the emotional and instinctual overdrive from the night. He did return, and I limbered and stretched as much as I could, then we approached the fence.

I put my overshirt over the barbed wire once again and attempted to climb the fence. My leg muscle protested violently and I had to jump back down. I stretched out the cramp and assessed the fence again. There were no poles on this side of the fence to hold onto and pull myself up, like I did to get into the enclosure. Finally, I climbed back up, and he sat me on his shoulder. From there, I reached my foot onto the top of the fence and pulled myself into a crouching position on top of the barbed wire. I tried to swing around the T intersection to just climb back down the other side, but my balance was off and my muscles were not cooperating. So I stepped back down onto the propane tank from last night. It took him several tries, but he finally managed to pull himself up onto the fence also. Only he was able to swing around and reach the basin on the outside. He stepped down onto the path, completely unprotected. I reached for the fence one more time and hauled myself up. My arms and legs were trembling with the exertion now, not the cold. He leaned under me and allowed me to use his shoulder to sit upon while trying to reach the basin. I finally stepped down. We were now both outside our sanctuary, open and vulnerable to anything that might be watching. We walked out of the weeds to the path. Before I could take more than a couple steps, he reminded me to pick up some large rocks, just in case. We both knew the creature would be sleeping now, but we didn't really know for sure. I picked up 4 large rocks and we began walking.

We hiked down the hill, my legs trembling, my knees buckling under the strain, my hands frozen into claws around the rocks. We reached the bend in the road where we encountered the three dark shapes a lifetime ago.

"Look, there are three bushes! They were just bushes!" I said. A great relief washed over me as I thought the whole thing could have been a figment of our imaginations, even while I thought wryly of the hours on top of the water tower.

"Um, look over here," he said. I turned and saw him peering over the side of the road into the grass, where we first heard the footsteps. I walked to the edge of the road and looked. About 2 feet from the edge of the road, about 6 or 7 feet by 3 or 4 feet wide, a huge swath of grass was flattened and matted to the earth a mere arm's reach away. My heart stopped beating. Then it started again as adrenaline coursed through my veins yet one more time. We looked at each other, then looked around, scanning the area. We quickly resumed our walk back downhill.

We began talking again, as we constantly surveyed the hills around us. Wispy tendrils of fog clung to the hills in the lower valleys and canyons. In spite of our sleepless night and aching bodies, and our tense alertness to our predicament, we found one more bit of evidence of Nature's beauty. The beauteous and the terrible exist in the same place. What is alluring and comforting can also be dangerous. The fog looked like a fluffy down blanket, but it also hid unknown dangers. The sunrise banished all night creatures and showed us the way home, but it also illuminated the evidence that we really were not alone the night before. We continued walking.

We made it to the car, and we tossed our rocks into the grass. We headed home.

The Inn Between © 2002